Like many African countries, Lesotho is undergoing digital transformation. The country has digitized some strategic government services and now targets new ones. 

Revenue Services Lesotho (RSL) launched, on March 14, an online collection system that allows taxpayers to file tax returns and pay dues online.  According to a release issued by the government, the electronic service aims to expand the use of technology and facilitate tax payments. 

For some time now, the Southern African Customs Union's (SACU) revenue has been declining, according to Finance Minister Retšelisitsoe Matlanyane (photo).  As a result, the country is receiving fewer and fewer resources to finance the national budget.  

So, to complement those revenues, Lesotho is implementing a set of measures (including the launch of the new system) to facilitate the collection of taxes and duties citizens and businesses owe the state.  

According to Ms. Mathabo Mokoko, the acting commissioner general of the RSL, the new system will greatly facilitate tax filing and payment while reducing transportation costs and the fees needed for manual procedures. 

Samira Njoya

Human resources are one of the key components for the success of every firm, organization, or institution. However, identifying the best professionals sometimes takes a huge amount of time. With his deep-leaning tool, Mouhidine Seiv shortens the curve.

Mouhidine Seiv (photo) is a Mauritanian entrepreneur and data scientist. In 2016, he founded HrFlow.ai (formerly known as Riminder.net.) to leverage artificial intelligence to help firms hire better human resources for improved efficiency.  

HrFlow.ai allows "recruiters to identify three times more talent while interviewing four times fewer candidates by analyzing millions of resumes worldwide. We have developed deep learning algorithms to evaluate and classify every part of a candidate's profile: experience, projects, and education. This technique allows us to achieve unparalleled relevance," Mouhidine Seiv told  French magazine Décideurs in 2017.

Beyond its recruitment assistance services, HrFlow.ai also assists companies and vendors in their General Data Protection Regulation, privacy regulations, algorithmic consent constraints, and fairness requirements compliance procedures. 

From 2016 to date, through HrFlow.ai, Mouhidine Seiv has helped more than a hundred firms automate their human resources data management. The tech entrepreneur is a former visiting assistant professor of deep learning at CentraleSupélec, the graduate engineering school of Paris-Saclay University. In 2017, Leade.rs ranked him among the eight under-30 emerging entrepreneurs to watch in France. Some years later, he also made it to Forbes’ “30 under 30” list. 

Melchior Koba

After an extensive professional career, he decided to go back to his native country and offer effective data management solutions. 

Philippe Nkouaya (photo) is a Cameroonian entrepreneur and founder of Philjohn Technologies, an IT services and consulting startup. Through the startup he founded in 2017, he offers firms sustainable solutions for quick file processing and sorting. 

The startup was created following its founder’s insurance coverage issues. “It took [the insurer] close to a year to process my claim just because I was unable to find my files,” Philippe explains. After that incident, he decided to find solutions so that firms can find any file in “under three seconds.” 

He is nowadays a reference in Cameroon. He graduated from The Limoges Computer Sciences Engineering School with a Master’s in Computer Science in 2016. But, his professional career began four years earlier in the entertainment industry. That year, he became the manager of Hope Music Group in Cameroon. In 2014, in conjunction with his duties at Hope Music Group, he was also an assistant IT manager for the communication firm Global Link. 

In 2016, he worked as a business intelligence analyst at Business & Decision Group and then as an external IT consultant at Sanofi Pasteur, France.  In 2017, he became the Chairman of Hope Music Group, in conjunction with his duties as chairman of Hope Clothing. When he launched Philjohn Technologies, he was a member of the board of Hope Management & Consulting (HOMCO).

Philippe Nkouaya is an E-Ambassador for Campus France. He also won several awards for his works in the digital entrepreneurship sector. He is for instance one of the beneficiaries of the 2018 TEF entrepreneurship program.  In 2018, he received the Francophonie 35 under 35 Youth Awards and was named best digital entrepreneur at the Bonteh Digital Media Awards. That same year, he was also on Avance Media's list of the Top 50 most influential young Cameroonians. 

Melchior Koba

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The Port Authority of Douala is set on making digital transformation its choice weapon to improve efficiency, security, and revenues. In that regard, in the past five years, it implemented several projects with more to go. 

In Cameroon, the entrance fees generated by the Port of Douala rose fourfold thanks to digitalization. According to Lieutenant Colonel Bertrand Mekinda, deputy MD of Douala Port Security -the firm in charge of securing the Port of Douala-  entrance revenues jumped from XAF250 million in previous years to XAF1 billion currently. The revenues may rise further to XAF2 billion yearly when new entrance booths become operational, he estimates. 

To digitize the entrance fee collection system, the port created an access badge system for users, the official revealed during a press conference on Friday 15, 2022. 

The badge costs XAF1500. It stores users’ information on a server allowing QR code readers to read it when they return . Therefore, users can not resell them once they are within the port and the 24 hours validity period is still on.  Unlike the old system that consisted in selling paper tickets, entrance revenues are more secure with the digital system because port authorities now have a clear view of the number of people who access the port during a specific period. 

In the past five years, the Port Authority of Douala (PAD) implemented several projects to secure its operations, and improve port security and efficiency. For instance, it installed more than 400 HD video surveillance cameras and built a security task force building that houses a data center and a CCTV operations and control room.  

The PAD also plans to buy a management software that will facilitate the digitalization of all the port operations and services. Ten departments are concerned, namely customer relationship management,  performance monitoring, incoming and outgoing ships’ management, and cargo tracking. 

Ruben Tchounyabe

For a long time, many public actors have launched health platforms that did not help efficiently take care of patients across Morocco. Now, the government wants to change things, as it is more concerned about inclusive healthcare.

During a public communication on Saturday, April 9, Khalid Ait Taleb (photo), the Moroccan Minister of Health and Social Protection, announced the upcoming launch of a national e-health system. It will provide citizens equal access to health records and other online services.

Through the new platform, the government wants to put an end to the existing fragmented e-health system, set up by university hospitals, regional health authorities, and various national health programs, said Khalid Ait Taleb. Indeed, nationwide, two programs have established electronic platforms: the National Maternal and Child Health Program and the Tuberculosis Program.  

The idea of an integrated national e-health system is a recommendation of the Mohammed V University of Rabat. In a summary report on e-health in Morocco prepared by its e-health innovation center, the academic institution assessed the national health system and identified opportunities and challenges for e-health solutions that match the digital transformation strategy undertaken by the government over the past 20 years.

According to the Minister of Health and Social Protection, during the Covid-19 crisis, innovative e-health solutions boosted the resilience and responsiveness of the country's health system. The official added that telemedicine and online access to health services are in line with the country's legal framework for the protection of personal data and the practice of medicine.

Ruben Tchounyabe

ICTs have many goals, including the reduction of time needed to collect and process data. The project, in this form, gives the State more flexibility in how it uses collected data.

Seychelles will start its first nationwide digital census on April 22, 2022. It will collect data on its population, households, and voters, said on April 5 the deputy director-general of the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), Helena Butler-Payette. Unlike previous years where the census was done using forms to be filled, this year it will be fully digital. 

“One of the biggest changes in the way we do things resides in the digitalization of census,” said Butler-Payette while adding that training sessions, for about 500 door-to-door surveying agents, have already started. 

Since it became independent, Seychelles has carried out six census operations; the first two in 1977 and 1987. The following censuses (1994, 1997, 2002, and 2010) focused on meeting national needs, especially the delineation of administrative borders. According to the NBS, Seychelles had 99,728 residents in 2021, 0.8% more than the figure recorded in 2020. This year’s census should have taken place in 2020 (it takes place every 10 years) but it was postponed to 2022 due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

In addition to data on the population and households, agents deployed will also gather voters’ data. Commenting on the operation, Helena Butler-Payette said it is better to use the same resources now to carry out the two surveys instead of wasting money doing both separately. Overall, the government plans to spend 904,000$ on the operation.

The NBS believes that conducting the survey digitally would allow results to be obtained more rapidly. “Before, it took us nearly a year to draw reports from the data we collected during the census, but this time, it will take us only weeks or months,” the NBS official declared.

Ruben Tchounyabe

The LOGIRAD is DRC’s new integrated public finance management system. It was adopted last Friday, March 25th, in Kinshasa, during the council of ministers. 

The new digital system is aimed at making the collection of taxes, duties, and fees more secure for the central government. Additionally, LOGIRAD will help the government optimize domestic revenue mobilization, knowingly by helping it better manage administrative and legal disputes, protect the tax collection circuit, limit human intervention and tackle fraud. 

Per Article 3 of the tax law No. 13/003 of February 23, 2013, amended and supplemented by Article 47 of the 2022 finance law, the Democratic Republic of Congo will issue a statutory law, making LOGIRAD the compulsory platform for tax and non-tax procedures. 

In the country’s 2022-2024 medium-term budgetary framework presented in September 2021, the Ministry of Finance makes LOGIRAD a key asset in the public revenues’ protection arsenal. The digital system is expected to heavily contribute to the collection of additional revenues for the implementation of essential socio-economic development projects. 

According to DRC’s medium-term budgetary framework,  provincial governments’ overall expenditure budget over 2022-2024 amounts to some FC89,999.8 billion (US$44.7 billion) against FC74,797.8 billion for the central government.  

Muriel Edjo

Burundi validated last March 17 the final plan of its digital tax collection project. The plan was validated by provincial governors, council tax officers, and communal administrators during a workshop organized by the Ministry of Home Affairs and the United Nations Development Program (UNDP). 

The final plan provides for the adjustment of the legal framework, identification and allocation of identification numbers to every taxpayer, and the acquisition and deployment of IT equipment. It also plans for the connection of every municipality to the national power and internet network as well as training for the communal staff that will be in charge of daily communal revenue collection. The plan’s pilot phase will be launched next July in sixty townships. 

For Niteretse Martin (photo), permanent secretary of the Ministry of Home Affairs, the collection of communal tax revenues is being digitized to improve efficiency, boost transparency and improve the relationship between the public administration and citizens by offering efficient services to users. 

The March 17 workshop is the ultimate result of instructions issued by President Evariste Ndayishimiye at the end of the January 4-5, 2022, government retreat. After the retreat, on January 27, another workshop was organized to validate the diagnostic assessment of communal tax collection in the country. The digitalization of communal tax collection is perceived as a solution to poor communal management. The latter translates into financial losses for the government. However, the authorities expect digitalization to guarantee good governance and steady communal tax incomes.

Ruben Tchounyabe

Egypt’s Ministry of Finance, on March 9, commissioned German software provider SAP and US tech firm IBM Consulting to install a digital platform for the country’s tax procedures. This move aims to improve tax procedures and optimize revenue collection.

The two contractors will roll out an integrated solution based on the SAP® Tax and Revenue Management for Public Sector. Designed to provide the Ministry of Finance with comprehensive business automation tools, the platform will help the Ministry streamline and automate its processes, enhance collaboration and improve citizen experience. The system was successfully tested in 10 tax offices in Greater Cairo but this year, it will be rolled out in every region.

Under the terms of the contract binding the three parties, IBM will also install IBM Cloud Pak for Business Automation solution, a tool designed to integrate artificial intelligence (AI) into the ministry of finance’s processes. It will streamline and automate the tax procedure, ensuring accurate tax declarations, offering taxpayers more knowledge of the taxation process while allowing tax authorities to focus on high-value tasks like reducing tax evasion and improving revenues.

The project is part of the Egypt Vision 2030 development strategy launched in 2016. One of the main focuses of that strategy is the modernization of public services.

Meanwhile, the digitization of the tax system is part of the unified tax procedure law aimed at maximizing government revenues. On February 22, Ragab Mahrous, spokesperson for the Ministry of Finance, explained that taxes account for 75% of the Egyptian government’s revenues. Therefore, it is crucial for the country, which has several development projects, to optimize tax collection.

Adoni Conrad Quenum

Uganda started digitizing its public services more than 10 years ago. Subsequent achievements confirm the soundness of the decision that the Ugandan government took much earlier than most African countries.

Uganda saved an average of USh4 trillion (US$1.1 billion) yearly over the last ten years thanks to digitization.  The figure was disclosed by Hatwib Mugasa, executive director of the country’s information technology authority NITA-U, in Kampala last Wednesday, March 23, during the Huawei ICT Congress 2022.

“This cost would have been spent on paper, manual processes, and data centers’ service fees for each ministry, department, and agency,” the government official explained. As part of its digitization project, the government has  “rolled out over 4172km of backbone fiber cable in over 62 Districts of Uganda,” he added. It also includes “rolling out last-mile fiber cable to extend connectivity to the grass-root user all the way to the Parish.”

“In a few weeks from now we shall have completed 764km under the Last Mile Phase and citizens shall be able to access e-government services at 1,400 administrative locations,”  he concluded.

The financial gains aside, digitization also helped save time for citizens who can now pay their taxes, request passports, and register a business online, Hatwib Mugasa indicated. 

Uganda is currently one of the African countries with the highest e-government readiness score. In its latest "E-government development index 2020", the International Telecommunication Union ranked the country 18th out of 54 on the continent. The country's score of 0.4499 out of 1 is above the East African (0.3738) and African (0.3914) average. In 2010, its e-government development score was 0.2812.

 Adoni Conrad Quenum